


Lessons in Confidence

by chaoticprocrastinator (order_of_chaos)



Category: Homestuck
Genre: BDSM, Discipline, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-15
Updated: 2013-03-15
Packaged: 2017-12-05 08:30:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 573
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/720985
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/order_of_chaos/pseuds/chaoticprocrastinator
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kankri teaches Karkat confidence.  Contains BDSM, mostly the discipline part of it, nudity, and no sex at all (I am not sorry).</p>
            </blockquote>





	Lessons in Confidence

**Author's Note:**

> Red collar Karkri fic, for Lactoria! Inspired by [this fic](http://lactoria.tumblr.com/post/45234430661/bittersweet-vignettes-a-series-of-memories-behind) of hers. Contains BDSM, mostly the discipline part of it, nudity, and no sex at all (I am not sorry).

He takes your bravado first, piece by piece, and once you’re stripped bare and defenceless, he takes your clothes. He takes your safe, anonymous gray and replaces it with a band of bright red around your neck, blatantly displaying your blood colour. It’s tight; unforgettably but not uncomfortably so. You feel it as you breathe.

He demands pride from you, deeper than you have to give, without even your usual bluster to hide behind. Dignity. 

You can’t. Your eyes skid away from his, time after time. You curl into yourself against the shame of being seen. 

He pulls you over his lap and spanks you. His hand is hard, implacable, and he only stops when you start to cry, leaking pain and failure all over the place. He strokes your hair, your neck, the full length of your spine. He touches you and tells you you are beautiful, you are brave. You are good.

You try again.

And again.

You crawl with your chin up at his command. Stand to your full height, when you’re permitted to stand, back straight, eyes meeting his. Move without haste or hesitation. Speak as if you respect both yourself and your speaking partner. 

He demands your opinions. You learn to give them, then to defend them.

You discover yourself, free from the protective layers of self-loathing and denial. You care, intensely enough to be impractical. You want the chance to prove yourself, believe that you won’t get it, that there’s no point in trying. On Alternia, that might have been true; it’s not, now. You want, desperately, to be pitied, to be protected. You want to be a leader, but not all the time. You’re scared, that you will die, that your friends will die, that your friends will turn out not to be your friends at all. 

You love, and you fear, and for the first time in sweeps you don’t hate yourself for it. These are your emotions, and you are entitled to them.

You are Karkat Vantas, voluntary property of Kankri Vantas.

You think you’re getting the hang of this.

He makes things harder. 

He stops you with a sneer and asks you to tell him what you did wrong. You don’t know. You’re sorry.

He bends you over the couch and paddles you until you sob. He pets the hair around your horns until you’re boneless and purring. Then he explains.

You did nothing wrong. 

For your next lesson, he teaches you not to assume you did.

He sets you challenges, tasks difficult enough that you can’t see how he expects you to get them right. You try your best, and fail. When he asks you what you did wrong, you answer everything, can’t imagine answering otherwise. Nothing has gone right for you today.

He spreads you out on the nutrition-block table and does excruciating things with claws and candlewax. Once he’s done, he rubs soothing cream into your back, easing tension out of stiff muscles as he goes. You let yourself cry. He leans down and presses a kiss to your temple.

You did nothing wrong, he tells you. You have to be bad at things before you can become good at them; that’s how life works.

You’re not useless. 

Every time he finds a chink in your confidence, he breaks you down, builds you up again, stronger.

You’re not perfect. You don’t need to be. 

You’re not a failure. 

You’re learning.


End file.
